What does this mean for the reform effort overall, and for Snowe’s role going forward? Opinionland has been busy all day with these questions.

At Mother Jones, Kevin Drum says his reform predictions are growing even rosier: “My forecast for healthcare reform, which has already increased from 60 percent to 70 percent to 75 percent, now goes to about 90 percent. There are still plenty of details to fight over, but Snowe’s decision makes success of some kind far more likely than not.”
Ezra Klein at the Washington Post is also optimistic. “Health care reform will now pass its fifth and final committee,” he wrote at The Washington Post after Snowe announced her intention to vote yes earlier today. “It will have a high-profile Republican supporter in the Senate. There are compromises left to be made, and bad days left to be endured, but health-care reform has the votes. It has them in the House. It has them in the Senate. It looks to have enough of them, in fact, to overcome a filibuster. That is to say, it looks to have enough of them to actually become law.”

At his blog, Paul Krugman says: “The momentum is now all with reform.”

At the American Specator, Philip Klein says not so fast, there are still internal conflicts for the Democracts to resolve: “This is a good headline for Democrats today, but it doesn’t solve the underlying friction between moderate and liberal members of Congress.”

The ability to attract one Republican may strengthen Baucus’s hand during negotiations with Majority Leader Harry Reid and Sen. Chris Dodd (representing the HELP Committee) and embolden Blue Dogs . . . to oppose the inclusion of a government-run plan in the House. Everything will hinge on whether House liberals cave in on their demand for a government plan, or dig in.

Not everyone thought that Snowe casting her lot with the Democrats was good for reform. Noam Scheiber writes at The New Republic: “You can make an argument that Dems didn’t want Snowe’s vote today.”

Why? Because it gives her way too much leverage over the whole process. I think Snowe always intended to vote for a health care bill this year barring some aggressive leftward turn, which the White House and Senate leadership are pretty determined to prevent. So you basically had her vote on the Senate floor even if she didn’t vote for the bill in committee. . . .

On the other hand, now that Snowe has voted for the bill in committee, she can basically dictate the terms of the final bill. (Anyone wondering about the havoc she might wreak need only look at the stimulus.) That’s because, if you alienate her during the forthcoming negotiations, her defection from the final bill would be disastrous. Just imagine the atmospherics of Olympia Snowe getting up on the Senate floor and saying she was so serious about passing health care reform she voted for it in committee, but that she can no longer support the bill because it’s moved too far to the left. It would be absolutely devastating.

Long story short: You don’t need Snowe to pass health care. But getting her vote in committee will probably lead to a worse bill. And getting her vote and then losing it later is pretty much the only way health care reform dies this year. So I was rooting for a “no vote” from Snowe today.

Writing earlier in the day, before Snowe had announced her decision, Ezra Klein argued the opposite point of view: “Liberals should hope for an ‘aye’ from Snowe.”

If she abandons the bill, that empowers Ben Nelson as the eventual dealmaker, much as he was during stimulus. He’s already announced that he won’t vote for the legislation without some bipartisan support, and if he’s the guy left to secure that support, he may well do exactly what he did during the stimulus debate: create a voting bloc out of a couple conservative Democrats and Snowe and Collins that will delay cloture until they secure a package of idiosyncratic and damaging concessions that infuriate liberals. But this isn’t the stimulus. A move like that could blow up whatever delicate compromise emerges from the HELP/Finance blender, and throw the negotiations into a late and unnecessary chaos. On health-care reform, it’s a lot more dangerous to leave the power with the most conservative Democrat than the most liberal Republican.

At The Washington Monthly, Steven Benen tried to find the middle ground between the it’s good and it’s bad camps. “So, is this good news or bad? A bit of both, actually.”

When the committee approves the bill, it will be a “bipartisan” success, giving reform some additional momentum as it moves towards the floor. It also offers the center-right Dems some cover they’ve long sought. What’s more, as Ezra noted, Snowe may hold disproportionate sway over the outcome, but all things being equal, that’s probably preferable to Ben Nelson to be driving the process.

On the other hand, Noam Scheiber makes a compelling case that Snowe may not use all of her power for good: “Just imagine the atmospherics of Olympia Snowe getting up on the Senate floor and saying she was so serious about passing health care reform she already voted for it, but that she can no longer support the bill because it’s moved too far to the left. It would be absolutely devastating.”

Snowe, not incidentally, reiterated her opposition to a public option this afternoon, right before announcing her support for the Finance Committee bill.

By voting yes, Snowe remains relevant — the Baucus bill passes with that shiny “bipartisan” sheen that seems still to matter to in Washington. But don’t forget that she has her finger on the “trigger” — her trigger that would kill the public option. As BTD says, she’s kept the Baucus bill alive, and through it the best chance of a making what now seems inevitable — reform of some kind — as watered down as possible.

The majority does have the votes to pass this without her, and she’s basically threatening them to do just that, calculating that keeping her name attached to reform will be the goal for the negotiators. Those negotiators should actually take her up on that threat, and craft a bill that could pass without her. Their larger hurdle remains the House Progressive Block, which isn’t backing down from it’s insistence on real reform.

Likewise, Jon Walker at Firedoglake called today a “good day for Baucus, bad day for real reform.”

Snowe has long been opposed to some of the most important elements of reform. I’m not just referring to her opposition to a real public option and her support for a worthless trigger proposal.

Snowe opposes a real employer mandate, and instead favors a disastrously stupid “free rider” provision. It could have serious consequences for low-income workers.

She is against giving the exchanges the power to negotiate with private insurance companies. This is a provision that should help keep down the cost of health care. It would save individuals money and the government money. Snowe fears it is too much government involvement. John Kingsdale, who runs Massachusetts’s exchange, called Snowe’s insistence that the exchanges not have the power to negotiate price with insurance companies a recipe for disaster.

In the same speech where Snowe declared that she would support the Senate Finance legislation, she gave some clues about what it will take for her to vote yes to the final health care bill. In a word, affordability. “All Americans should have access [to health care] and we should absolutely know that they are affordable,” she said a couple of minutes ago.

Though the Finance bill limits the penalties for people who don’t buy health insurance, Snowe wants to make sure the final measure assures that everyone can afford insurance.

She quoted poet and fellow Maine resident Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, saying “great is the art of the beginning, but greater is the art of the ending.”

The private health insurance companies have been major beneficiaries of Medicare, dubbed as “socialized medicine,” in some circles. As people reach an age when their rate of illness increases and their costs for medications go through the roof, the private insurance pass the ball to Medicare. I’m on Medicare now, plus supplemental insurance, yet I still pay more than $800 most months for the meds that keep me alive. When I was younger and my medication needs were miniscule compared to now, my private insurance policies had me fully covered. Who’s pulling who’s leg here? Sterling Greenwood/Aspen Free Press

Being a simple person I just don’t get why Olympia’s vote ever mattered to begin with. Geewhiz! Just cause she’s female republican? Now she’s a moderate? Who care’s exactly? She’s a rich DUFUS!!! Always has been. I’m confused. A Jerk is a Jerk. No matter what skin or sex they are. Now this jerk has more power than she ever thought or drempt of. I’m sure now she’s consulted her psychic who told her years ago that she was the reincarnation of Cleopatra/Hera that HE/SHE was correct! Annoying.

Health Care Reform… Health Care Reform? Is it really health care reform if all Americans still can’t afford to go to the doctor? I don’t want affordable health INSURANCE, I want affordable health CARE. I want to be able to go to any doctor, not the emergency room, and not have to fear losing my house.
And get real, the government is going to penalize Americans for NOT buying insurance!! Give me a break! If you can’t afford insurance, why would you pay the penalty? That’s just like arresting someone who steals a loaf of bread because he’s hungry, while continuing to look the other way while CEOs steal millions from the American people. What’s going to happen with all of those people who are unemployed, work for cash, or live on the street? Are we going to put them in jail because they can’t pay the penalty???
Forget the “Public Option” or “Exchanges”. Nothing will change unless there is a government-sponsored single payer plan. Politicians really have no shame. They should do what the American people elected them to do and what poll after poll says they want them to do.

I don’t care, as long as ‘Medicare for All’
is off the table.
I wanted ‘Medicare for All’.
‘Health Insurance’=30 %
‘Medicare for All’=3%

.gov should handle the system,
not some profit-driven ‘insurance’.
Do I want my neighbors to be paying
for my operation?
You bet!
Unless we are all in the POOL,
it will fail.
I will pay for my neighbor’s operation.

Now that Olympia has come down from visiting the Oracle of Delphi and finally took a stand, we must work hard for a public option, which Mount Olympia will not support, through budget reconcilliation if neccessary, because the Finance Committee bill is not reform.

Is health care for maintaining and restoring good health throughout a person’s lifetime a right or a privilege?

If you think that it is a right, then neither want of money nor any loss of profit for a payor or caregiver should cause it to be deprived.

If you think that it is a privilege, then by all means only provide to those who can pay and pay well for it.

If you take the latter position, then we need to make sure that indigent care that is not fully supported by charities is never provided. Otherwise, the taxpayers and premium payors will continue to pay for the care of those who cannot pay for it themselves.

As a country we are paying too much and getting too little for our investment in health care. It is sapping the capital that we might use to pay off our debts or to invest in new business opportunities. We we diverting money into health care that could be generating wealth instead.

Our current system makes no sense in terms of meeting our needs for health care nor does it make sense for increasing the wealth of the country.

Amen, one person in the Republican party cares more about doing what is right for this country then getting revenge on our popular democratic president.
You can debate all day whether it was good or bad for the the political games still to come. And I don’t agree with her on some issues, like getting rid of the very important public option.
But I have gained respect for her sticking her neck out in her own party to do what she knew was right. She is already getting attacked by her own and being called unpatriotic.
My how quickly they turn on each other.
If it’s unAmerican to want to provide basic healthcare to all of our citizens, then what do you call bringing guns to townhall meetings and threatening our President. They are so upside down and confused, they don’t even see how lost they are and how much damage they stand to continue to inflict on this country, which desperately needs to get it’s priorities straight if we are to continue to prosper and be an example of democracy for the rest of the world.

I am glad she voted “Aye” but not for reasons adduced above. She did it because she thought it was right. She bucked her party and declared her independence of it. She is an amazing lady — strong, ethical, intelligent and occupying a very safe seat. If I were the GOP, I would not retaliate. It will only make her stubborn.

I urge Democrats to keep fighting for a public option, even though that will mean this is not a bipartisan bill. History will prove us right, and even more importantly, lives will be saved… that of a mother, a father, a daughter, a son, a grandmother…. Take heart!

President Obama, this is the time to put up a fight. This is why I worked toward your election.

I think Snowe is and always will be a sell out. If she wants to be a DEM then be one and quit playing games. She votes with no thought of what will happen to us. That’s those of us who foot the bills for her folly. Nice job Maine you must be proud of her.

I think it was pretty foreordained that one or more Republicans would eventually support the bill. I think the real question is will a bill that forces millions of people who don’t want insurance to buy it, and still leaves millions who do want insurance without it, be considered a success? This strikes me as a much more difficult question, and I don’t think its answer is clear.

If you think that Snowe (and Collins) are moderates, you gave been the victim of a Snowe job. I tried to contact Snowe once & was told that I was irrelevant because I was not from Maine. I tried very hard to contact Collins when she was on her phoney ‘dog and pony’
show about degree mills. I wanted her to know that, in over 25 years of reviewing applications for federal employment, I had never encountered a degree mill (yes, I know where to look); I had, however, encountered legal state-licensed schools that lacked regional certification–a requirement for all professional positions in Federal Service. She was not interested. Only Maniacs would vote for either.

Interesting stuff. Only one Republican. While I want to feel optimistic that Snowe is now on board with reform (of some sort), I can’t help but think she may have simply voted yes to increasing her (and Republican’s) negotiating position. Since she did vote yes, it seems obvious that Democrats will continue to court her and make concessions to her in exchange for a yes vote. The ultimate result may be a highly-watered down bill that fails to significantly achieve either of the main goals of reform: expanded coverage and lower costs. Will be very interesting to see how this all shakes out, but let’s hope that Snowe’s vote was in good faith and that she continues to work diligently and honestly towards a final bill.

I WILL FORCED pay for health care whether I cAN AFFORD OR NOT. That is great reform… and my husband who is on Medicare and has a Medical Advantage plan will loose his coverage. 25% of Medicare covered people will loose this coverage and now will be forced to purchased supplementally insurance from ,,,guess who.. THE INSURANCE COMPANIES at $200.00 per month

I don’t buy the argument that Olympia Snowe’s vote hurts the liberal cause–if liberals have the votes to pass a public option, they’ll go around a “couple of centrist Democrats” and two Republicans. But they probably don’t have that power, Snowe’s vote or not, so they won’t. It would require reconciliation, and they may not get 50 or so Senators to agree to do that.

I called Senator Snowe’s office today to offer my congratulations for her vote. I agree with the previous poster, I’m a democrat, and don’t agree with Senator Snowe on many issues, but I appreciate her willingness to not tow party line and at least move things forward. A public option is necessary, and the final bill may end up without her support, but given the negativity of the extreme right and their collective unwillingness to call out lies for political gain, and not offer real solutions to our problems, her vote gave me a small glimmer of hope.

Senator Snowe is one of the more thoughtful and intellectually honest member of the Senate. Her decision that it is time for members of both parties to work together to pass health care reform suggests that the opposition of the other Republicans on the Committee is dictated more by politics (do whatever it takes to defeat President Obama even if that means depriving millions of Americans of health insurance) than by their ostensible policy concerns. By showing her GOP colleagues’ stance for what it is, Senator Snowe’s vote may well turn out to be the key to winning passage of the bill.

Senator Snowe is a nice person and an earnest senator. However, Lisa (above) is wrong. Senator Snowe has not always been “a rich DUFUS”. She became a multi-millionaire only after she gained a seat on the Senate Finance Committee in 2001 when her husband’s “risky” investments paid off.

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The Thread is an in-depth look at how the major news events and controversies of the day are being viewed and debated across the online spectrum. Compiled by Peter Catapano, an editor in The Times’s Opinion section, the Thread is published every Saturday in response to breaking news.